Inside The Bills

Most NFL observers have capably recognized that former Bills head coach Rex Ryan and current Bills head coach Sean McDermott are polar opposites when it comes to approaching their job and the philosophy in building a winner as well. Bills Pro Bowl guard Richie Incognito has seen the difference first hand and explained the dichotomy between the two coaches in his appearance on NFL Network Monday night.

“The biggest difference with coach McDermott is he brings energy, he brings passion,” said Incognito. “He’s really stressing the football team loving one another. He’s really big on guys getting to know each other, building that winning culture. He’s very passionate. He’s a former wrestler. He brings a lot of good things to the table.

“I’m most excited about the winning culture that we’re forming. He’s doing a bunch of cool activities like having guys get up and speak in front of the team and talk about why football is important to them. I’m learning more about my teammates that I’ve played with for the last two seasons in a couple weeks in Buffalo than I’ve known for the last two years.”

Incognito also acknowledged that the culture of the team had to change after two years under Ryan.

“The culture change was needed. I love Rex [Ryan], I love what he brought to the team, but I don’t think our locker room was ready for it,” Incognito said. “I don’t think we had a veteran enough group to be able to adapt to Rex’s system and to be able to make that work. So now we have a young and hungry team, and with coach [Sean] McDermott coming in and being detail-oriented and holding guys accountable, hopefully that helps us take the next step.”

With the 2nd Circuit of the US Court of Appeals rejecting Tom Brady’s request for an en banc rehearing of his Deflategate case with the NFL, it makes it highly unlikely that the Patriots quarterback will play in the first month of the season. His four game suspension is likely to be served at the start of the 2016 season. That means he’ll miss the Patriots first game against the Bills in Week 4. One guy who is not happy about that is Bills DT Marcell Dareus.

“I hate that Brady’s not going to be there,” said Dareus in an appearance on NFL Total Access. “But when he comes back… it’s on.”

Buffalo’s second matchup with New England will be at Ralph Wilson Stadium in Week 8. If the Bills win the first meeting sans Brady, Dareus said he’ll take the victory, but it won’t feel the same.

“If we win, all right, we win. But I don’t feel like I really won until I beat the guy,” he said. “I love playing against Brady. I get up for him. I play against him every year, and he knows I’m coming. So for him not to be up there tears me up a little bit. But the second time I see him, I’m going to be excited to play against him. That’s the win we want.”

Bills GM Doug Whaley made an appearance on NFL Network’s All Access program and was asked about a comment made by Bills Wall of Famer Darryl Talley.

Talley claimed that Reggie Ragland is the best linebacker drafted by the Bills since Cornelius Bennett. Now in an effort to be accurate, Bennett was acquired by the Bills via trade on Halloween in 1987 in a blockbuster deal with the Indianapolis Colts. Biscuit was also an Alabama product. Either way it’s high praise from Talley. So what did Whaley think of that opinion?

“Time will tell but we’re excited about what he brings to our team,” Whaley said. “As coach has always said, what we want to be is a physical team. We want anybody that comes in to play the Buffalo Bills know that they’re going to have to strap that chinstrap up a little tighter and they’re going to know they’re going to be in a fight. That’s what he brings, physicality.

“And then you add to the fact that the defense he ran in college is very, very similar to the defense we’re going to be running this year. So all of that and then the combination of him coming from a winning program. All of those qualities just made us feel like this is the type of guy we want on our team. To tell you the truth, we thought he would be our pick at 19 so we never dreamed we would be able to get him and Shaq Lawson with our first two picks.”

It’s an obvious question for any NFL GM this time of year. What is the biggest need for your team with your top draft choice in round one? When Bills GM Doug Whaley was asked that question this morning in an appearance on NFL Network he left all his options open.

“We’ve lost some defensive players that’s true,” said Whaley. “But if you look up and down our roster there’s not a position on our squad where we wouldn’t have a chance to pick a guy at 19 and people would say, ‘Oh I can see why they did that.’ We need some depth in a lot of areas and we need some starters in a few areas. We’re going to look at every possible position and not limit ourselves.”

Many believe the Bills will lean heavily to the defensive side of the ball in the 2016 NFL draft. Whether that increases the likelihood of Buffalo taking a defensive player in round one largely depends on what comes off the board in front of them with the first 18 selections.

Bills GM Doug Whaley made an appearance on NFL Network Thursday morning and was asked about the team’s reported dinner with Memphis QB prospect Paxton Lynch. It was first reported by NFL.com’s Ian Rapoport that Buffalo had dinner with Lynch the night before his pro day Wednesday.

Whaley confirmed the report.

“Yes, we sent two coaches there, our offensive coordinator Greg Roman and our offensive assistant Chris Palmer,” said Whaley. “They did spend some time at dinner with Paxton Lynch. At this time of year we’re turning over every rock. You have to do your work. You never know what’s going to happen in the draft. Maybe even after the draft. Maybe we get information on Paxton for a possible trade in subsequent years or when free agency hits four or five years from now. So you always want to get as much information as you can on all these college guys this time of year.”

Whaley was also asked if Tyrod Taylor is the long term answer at quarterback. Here was his response.

“We want him to be and he wants to be,” said Whaley of Taylor. “Time will tell, but we’re excited about what he did last year. He went 8-6 as a starter. There’s a lot of excitement around our football. We were the number one rushing team in the league and we went 4-2 in our division so we’re excited. And I’ll tell you this about Tyrod, he’s a big time competitor and he’s going to want to raise the level of his game next year and we’re going to give him as much ammunition around him as we can so he can succeed.”

Bills QB Tyrod Taylor will be an in studio guest on NFL Network Saturday.

Taylor will join NFL Network’s NFL GameDay First in-studio Saturday at 10 am. Tyrod will join host Melissa Stark and analysts Shaun O’Hara, Michael Robinson and Brian Billick on the two-hour show. He’s slated to break down some of the Divisional playoff matchups. He played against both the Chiefs and Patriots.

After being traded to the Bills, LeSean McCoy was fully aware of a couple of things. The quarterback position had to be figured out, but that was no different than what he experienced in Philadelphia. The defense was really good and Greg Roman is a pretty darn good offensive coordinator and utilized his backs in a multitude of ways. His only question was how does the offensive line measure up? After two weeks of training camp McCoy feels pretty good about his trench men.

“They look good. That was kind of the question I had coming in: how was the offensive line? Being a young group, they’re very good,” said McCoy. “I think the kind of things that coach Greg [Roman] is asking for, they bring. They can move on the outside perimeter to get to the defense with pulling and even pass-blocking.

“It helps a lot going against one of the best defenses in the game, so going against them every day you only can get better. That’s probably the biggest change in this team, even bringing me here. The guys up front, from when we got here until now, they look the brightest on the team.”

NFL Network’s The Top 100 Players of 2015 continues tonight (Wednesday) at 9pm. During the show, a Bills player will be revealed ranked between No. 80 – 71.

This Bill will be a defensive player who is making his 2nd career appearance on the list. He’ll also be the first Bills player to be revealed so far. Here are players ranked No. 100 – 81 which have already been revealed.

In advance of tonight’s Bills-Dolphins game on Thursday night football, NFL Network will have a special piece on Jim Kelly and his cancer recovery. Reporter Andrea Kremer spends time with the Kelly family to get a feel as to just how things are going now and the difficult journey through Jim’s cancer treatment. Here are some more details.

The most poignant part of the piece is the Kelly family’s belief that returning to Buffalo to complete the cancer treatments was the key to Kelly’s recovery.

“I think that was the turning point. Absolutely,” said his wife Jill Kelly. “There is no doubt in my mind that coming back to Buffalo was the turning point for Jim…We went literally from one hospital to a hospital over here; one hospital in New York to a hospital in Buffalo. He came to life.”

“At times, there were people here that needed my support but I needed their support too,” said Jim Kelly. “There is not a family around here any bigger than the Buffalo Bill family. Everywhere I turn, there are people praying for me, there are people that give me well wishes and to be honest with you, I don’t know if I would have been able to make it anywhere else.”

As for his outlook now moving forward, Kelly is just trying to make the most of every day.

“I live every day. I know it’s a cliché [to live] every day to its fullest but I do,” he said. “I’m not going to change. Even though I have cancer, even though I’ve been through some tough times, it doesn’t matter because I’m going to live life to its fullest today because tomorrow I have no idea what is going to happen.”

The piece airs tonight on NFL Network at 6 pm ET on NFL Total Access Kickoff.

NFL Network analysts, and Hall of Famers, Deion Sanders and Michael Irvin like what they’ve seen from the Bills over the first two weeks of the season. Here was their take on Buffalo’s 2-0 start to the 2014 campaign.

“The Buffalo Bills, they have two running backs that are very capable, they have a receiver now that’s off the charts, they have a quarterback who’s learning,” said Sanders. “But defensively these guys are winning on that side of the ball. I feel like that’s why the Buffalo Bills are 2-0. I like them. I like them.”

“They’ve got a nice, young, talented team that they can have for a while to develop,” said Irvin.

The NFL Network has put together one-hour specials on all the Hall of Fame inductees for the 2014 class. The special on Andre Reed airs Thursday. Here are the details.

Called ‘The Road to Canton’ the series will feature former Buffalo Bills wide receiver Andre Reed starting at 10:00 PM ET on Thursday, July 31.

The title of the special is called ‘Middle Man: Andre Reed’. The one-hour special features footage of Andre Reed as a high school quarterback, his transition to becoming a speedy and reliable wide receiver at Kutztown University of Pennsylvania, and his consistent play from the slot in the NFL.

Reed was referred to being too small to have an impact in playing football until his senior year of high school. During his senior season, the Allentown, Pennsylvania native became the starting quarterback at Deiruff High School. The future NFL fourth round draft pick was at one point a tremendous talent in the Division II Eastern Pennsylvania Conference.

Andre was regarded by his coaches and teammates for his work ethic and desire for excellence. He made his mark by going across the middle from the slot and turning short passes up field for major yardage after the catch.

Once solidified in the NFL, Reed contributed to a Buffalo Bills team that made four straight Super Bowl appearances with fellow Hall of Famers Jim Kelly, Thurman Thomas, James Lofton and Bruce Smith. Even though they could never capture a ring, these players formed a family bond that exists to this day.

Middle Man chronicles those experiences for Andre Reed and also shows the story of how and why he attributes his success in life and the NFL to the values taught to him by his father who battled alcoholism throughout his life.

Middle Man features interviews with special people from Andre Reed’s life:

The run game was Buffalo’s bread and butter on offense as they ran more than any other team in the league and finished second in rushing yards per game. Blessed with the additional talents of Bryce Brown and Anthony Dixon, the Bills ground attack is as deep as it’s ever been. So just how critical will the Bills run game be to the team’s success this season. C.J. Spiller had an answer for that one.

“I think it’s going to be very important,” said Spiller. “I think it’s going to take a lot of pressure off E.J. [Manuel]. I think if we have our running game going, he’ll feel more comfortable relying on that. Instead of having him, going out there saying, ‘Hey E.J., we need you to throw the ball.’ It’s going to be very important to make sure that our running game is going on early and late in the season. It’s going to be exciting. The offensive line is going to jell together and hopefully we’ll have another great rushing year.”

The Bills have found it hard to compete for a division title in the AFC East as New England has largely ruled the division for the better part of the last dozen years. Buffalo usually plays all their division opponents tough, until some unfortunate play happens and the floodgates seem to open. C.J. Spiller knows what has to change to reverse that trend.

“If you go back and look at those games, we always play all those teams close,” Spiller said. “Obviously, sooner or later, [they] kind-of get out of hand. Against those type of teams, you can’t make mistakes. That’s the thing that’s been killing us against [those] teams is that we make mistakes and it’s hard for us to bounce back. So if we can minimize them, I think we have a chance of competing as one of the top [teams] in the AFC. I’m looking forward to it. Still a lot of work needs to be done. We still have to go out there and play the games.”

With the Bills poised to open training camp first in the league the NFL Network put their talking heads to work in predicting whether or not Buffalo can contend in the AFC East. One of the analysts was former Bill Shawne Merriman.

Merriman pointed to how they do outside the division as for how much they can contend for the postseason. Solomon Wilcotts puts it on EJ as for the team’s fortunes. And Cameron Jordan likes the defense. Here’s a look at their analysis.

Tonight (Wednesday) on the NFL’s Top 100 on NFL Network, Mario Williams became the fourth Bills player to appear on the list. His appearance at #29 also marks a league first in the four-year history of the countdown.

With the addition of Mario Williams, the Bills become the first team in the four-year history of the NFL’s Top 100 Players to have three defensive linemen appear in the Top 100 Players.

In the latest installment of the NFL’s Top 100 on NFL Network another Bills player will be featured tonight (Wednesday).

Tonight’s installment will count down from 30-21, and Buffalo will have their fourth player named in the countdown to this point. So far Kiko Alonso (#84), Marcell Dareus (#62) and Kyle Williams (#32) have been featured on the list.

NFL Network’s Top 100 airs Wednesday at 9 PM ET, followed by The Top 100 Players of 2014 Reactions show at 10 PM ET. Players who appear on this list are voted on solely by current NFL players.

NFL Network will have a Bills specific angle to their Path to the Draft programming tonight.

NFL Network’s Path to the Draft show will go inside the Bills draft room. NFL Network analysts Daniel Jeremiah and Charles Davis will co-anchor the Path to the Draft, and will be joined by NFL Network analyst Mike Mayock, Charley Casserly and Brian Baldinger, former first-round pick Curtis Conway, and various additional NFL Network analysts.